Magic Time Machine

My family, some friends, and myself went here Saturday at lunch time. Our total number of people was 11, which, having worked at a restaurant isn’t too bad… if you don’t give it to a waitress that already has a 20+ top. My husband had to go and ask the hostess if we were going to get service after sitting there for 20 minutes with none. Joy finally came over to tell us it would be another 5 minutes before she could come serve us. Another 10 minutes goes by, she comes back to take our drink orders. Our individual groups were aptly named Disgust and Anger. By this point we were considering leaving and were in the process of finding another restaurant. Most of the adults and all of the kids got a magic potion. Barely any alcohol in the adult version, probably a lot of sugar in the kids, which is to be expected. After drink orders were placed, another 15 goes by before we get them. She takes our orders when she brings back drinks and escorts us to the salad car. There was little room to maneuver and it was sub par salad. Food arrives within a reasonable amount of time, most of it cooked incorrectly or without the requested condiments. Kids finish and go on an autograph adventure, getting about 4 additional autographs. Hubby asks for refill, she forgets it (at this point She has us and a small table) and he tells her Nevermind. Brings out checks and a small refill for hubby. Check for 5 with sub par food, kids each getting a personal size cheese pizza ($ 12 each) was 105 (only 1 adult magic potion), gratuity having been added in already. They tipped more than we would have at that point, but we were able to leave with the kids having had a blast and each of us feeling as though our bank accounts had been robbed. Leaving was a hassle as the caricature man was right out front and the 20+ top that had been in our section were all having them done, making it difficult to get by. All in all we were there for 3 hours, when it wasn’t even busy. My family won’t be returning unless some serious changes are made in décor, pricing and overall service.

DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME. When I was a young adult I came here often (around ten years ago) I had fond memories. We came here today (of course after I had hyped it up to 6 other adults). It was a terrible experience. We had to wait twenty minutes to get seated (our party of 12 was seated at 2 different tables) if I come to eat with someone, I want to sit at the same table with them. It took 20 minutes to get a server (we had to request one). Joy eventually showed up. 20 minutes for drinks. Salad bar disgusting and hard to maneuvere around. 30 more minutes our food shows up. Steak was undercooked, buffalo chicken presented without ranch. Still no refills on pop. Check shows up for a family of four to eat subpar food, with a lame waitress with no tricks, was $ 135. No photographs, no magic tricks, no fortune teller, no magician, and not even a decent waitress. To be honest I wish MTM would of closed down years ago, so my nostalgia could remain. I will not be returning.

Service was just okay. The food took forever. We were told ‚“your food will be here shortly” 4 times. The restaurant itself smelled of cigarette smoke and considering the restaurant is geared toward kids, I found it gross. Most importantly, the food was good and the atmosphere was fun.

I took my daughters here for their first time and had a truly disappointing visit. Started out by being told the wait was 45 min. Ended up waiting 2 hours. Finally get seated and 20 minutes goes by without anyone coming to our table. 2 and a half hours at this place and we decided to just leave. Never received any service at all. Complete waste of time.

I need to start off by saying the ONLY reason this place gets even a 3 star is due to how bangin’ the spinach artichoke dip was.
Came here this past friday night for a coworkers birthday– we only used the bar section. Parking around 9pm was not horrible, I found a spot in the back pretty easily.
My biggest issue with this place was the indoor smoking. I thought it was illegal to smoke indoors? Must be only some places. But it was engulfing me from all sides– I could not escape it as soon as I walked up the stairs. The musty smell of the 70’s also took over.
The drinks and food were very reasonably priced– and tasted great. I was disappointed that the bartender who took my food order, and brought out a ton of other food to the table forgot to bring out my food. After 35 minutes I had to go up and ask. She said she would check and viola there it was– obviously it was forgotten. The gentleman bartender was kind of rude and obviously did not know how to make a drink to save his life.
I would also like to add that not even one chair matched– all different weird hippyish fabrics– which is cool. Very divey– the downstairs was different. I would give it a shot if the food was as good at the bar food upstairs.

This a fun family kid friendly, all servers dress on Disney characters. Food was excellent and the service was good. Little disappointed I asked for hot water and lemon and it was served on a soda glass, the hot water toke a bad flavor from the cup. Asked for a glass cup and it never come. Overall it in scale 1 – 10 this is a solid 8

We had a great time. The atmosphere, décor, and characters set a great mood for a fun time. Our waitress though made it a 5 star experience. We had «Jessie» and she was amazing. We were a party of 23, 7 different checks, a table of kids and 2 tables of adults. She didn’t mind the separate checks and kept up with which child belonged to which parent. Stayed in character the whole time, and managed 27 people like a pro! Entertaining and a good waitress. She was seriously the best! Thanks Jessie!

This place sucked. Staff clearly did not like their jobs. The food was over priced for bland food. Linguine noodles were cheap n rubbery hardly any sauce. Spent 72.00 waste of time and money. Salad car was gross had salad all over even on floor with 20 – 30 ppl all trying to get salad. Will never go back.

Visiting from Houston and LOVED this fun restaurant. The servers are a variety of movie and cartoon characters — we lucked into getting Mario. My son and husband were gleeful!
The magic potion drinks are a fun start as they come in both adult and alcohol-​free versions and arrive bubbling with smoke spilling off the top. A great way to start the mood. Each table is a different theme. We were in Sesame Street but called around and saw: spaceship, Peanuts, Ghostbusters, Halloween, Crayonbox, Lunchbox, school bus, TeePee, Tiki, Elvis, and pirates!
All meals come with a trip to the salad bar: a converted car with lots of salad veggie options. Plus fresh bread and butter delivered to the table.
We choose different meals: buffalo chicken tenders, chopped steak, sliced brisket, and prime rib. Everyone liked their meal except my son who felt the chicken was ok but the sauce really killed it– just had an odd tang he didn’t like.
Overall, enjoyed the service, the food, the experience. A fun experience for the whole family!

Place for the kids, seemed like the children were all having a blast… but note to parents: it’s pricey! Fun place, but food wasn’t great, not even average, and it was VERY overpriced. If you go, it’ll be for the decorations and characters. Dessert was tasty, and drinks were good. But that’s about it:/

The previous reviews are spot on. Food is really nothing to get excited about. The salad bar is ok and the pasta salad & potato salad on the bar tasted just like it came from a grocery store down the street. Food price is very high for the quality you receive. I had Fettuccine Alfredo with Vegetables, which I thought was the best dish we got that night. The individual loaves of bread are nice and hot that come with most of the plates but it definitely does not heat up well the 2^nd time. My son and daughter both got this kids «magic potion» drink that was HELLA sugary. Both where wired after dinner on the way home.
Now to me though, I did not find the place dirty like some previous reviews said. I didn’t detect a smell or wasn’t turned off by the look and feel of the place. The different server/​characters where good at what they do. This place to me is all for the kids and the experience they get from it. Glad that this place can now be checked off my list and I would be willing to go back in the future.

Mediocre food. Great portions. i brought my twinfants here. They loved it. We sat by the carousel with ceiling mirrors. They loved that. We had Aladdin. He was pretty nice. Kinda an underground reject cast from Disney. Kinda like the modern Disney characters, after they partied a lot and had kids, this is what they’d look like. But their spirits are the same, mostly. Overall cool place, definitely good first time place.

The food, cast, bar, layout and décor here is as delightful as I remember. Once you have a drink and go nose blind to the rotting wood smell, everything comes alive. A lot of reviews claim the smell was a symptom of a bigger problem, but the décor, furniture and floors were bright and remarkably well-​maintained. This place is fun. If you’re not in the mood, you should probably also avoid the breastaurant next door. FUN!

3.5 hours. THREE AND A HALF HOURS!
We went this past Sunday, had reservations for a bachelorette party at 7:30 with Cinderella. Cinderella didn’t show up. And we didn’t get seated until 8:15. Drinks came to our table around 9 and the food didn’t show up until 9:40. The drinks were sicky sweet and seemed to have no alcohol (we all ordered some variation of the magic potion).The salmon wasn’t cooked so our bachelorette didn’t even eat. My pasta marinara had zero sauce. By the time we got out it was 10:30 and we had had enough. We completely shut off the night and went home, it was THAT bad. If you can’t handle 10 people at a table, then don’t accept reservations for 10 people. Unacceptable.

The Magic Time Machine is a must if you have kids and want a cheesy/​fun restaurant to go to. After reading other reviews I was a bit shocked.
Most people know that this place is a legend and has been around forever… keep the creepy ambience of old carpet and furniture! The old-​ness is what I love about it.
This is my 3^rd time coming here over the past 10 years and we still enjoy.
Snow White was our waitress and she really got into character. the entire time! We started off by ordering the kids some magic potion drinks, and an adult one for me. Fun! I ordered the blue one and that was blue coconut rum:)
Then we took a trip to the salad car, the lettuce was fresh and so were the pairings.
Time for dinner! I decided to order the 3 by 4 (3 items that are 4 ounces each), grilled chicken, bacon wrapped shrimp and a bacon wrapped filet. All of this with honey bread and mashed potatoes was $ 23. The steak was yummy and cooked just how I like and the shrimp was big and fresh… bacon was cooked just right.
To celebrate our anniversary we chose the Fudge cake with vanilla ice cream… this was big, warm and enough for 2 or more to share. Oh I did want to mention we did sit in Gillian’s Island Hut!
We can’t wait to go back!

Average Sorcery
We went to The Magic Time Machine after a friend recommended the place. The décor was cool. I will give credit where it’s due. The menu choices and the food itself left a lot to be desired. I had to laugh at one of the menu options, the «Roman Orgy.» For a restaurant which is a prime attraction for families, I got a chuckle wondering how many kids had asked their parents, «Mom, what’s an orgy?»
My wife and I were placed in the Christmas room. I would have preferred the giant box of crayons, or perhaps the lunar landing module, but the Christmas room was okay. Our server was — I believe — Ariel from The Little Mermaid. She was very polite, but failed to call the utensils whatchamacallits or thingamabobs. I won’t hold that against her, because seriously, she did well as our server. I also don’t blame her for not suddenly growing a tail, because — you know — she’s not really a mermaid.
I got a pasta, and my wife got chicken parmesan. Both dishes were very average. There really isn’t much to say about the food other than I wish we hadn’t spent half an hour driving to get there in traffic for the same food that we could have had at any other generic restaurant. At a restaurant with such a cool environment, I expected a much wilder menu, or at least a new twist on a familiar dish.
If you are looking for average food in a funky environment, then go for it. If you have kids, they will dig it. Just don’t expect anything more than middle-​of-​the-​road fare.

It’s not easy paring Magic Time Machine down to a simple review because this is a multi-​sensory experience.
Let’s begin:
1) SIGHT: You pull up to a giant brick building and think, ‘This doesn’t look like a time machine unless I already went back in time 50 years’. Then you walk in and start looking for Vincent Price because it looks like the entrance to a Haunted Mansion. Between the old fading carpet and the paneled walls, you’re now convinced you have traveled back in time. Rather than basic tables, there are buses, space shuttles and caverns to dine in, if you so choose. And then you see the servers dressed as Tinkerbell or Snow White or someone else from a 1940’s Disney movie and just when you think you’re in the past, Professor Snape walks by, scolds you for holding your nose and casts a spell on you to convince you not to begin writing your review until the night is over.
2) SMELL: Why did Snape scold me for holding my nose? Because It smells horrible in this place. As if the previous owners had 17 cats and no litter box and never bothered to clean the carpet before you moved in. Just. Really. Bad.
3) TASTE: Surprisingly, the food wasn’t even close to horrible. The kids especially loved the chicken fingers (I did too) and popcorn shrimp and mom and dad were ok with their chicken parm and fried fish dinners. Dessert was a big win as well as we ordered everything from the chocolate cake to the bread pudding.
4) SOUND: Listen very closely and you’ll hear your server attempting to sound exactly like their character. Some of the time. When they remember. Ok, so the voice part is an afterthought. But how long can the Big Bad Wolf waiter keep huffing and puffing without blowing your house down, anyway? Our Princess Peach was adorably nasal and squeaky.
5) TOUCH: Magic Time Machine has some nice touches for adults and kids (not the bad kind of touches). First, there’s a caricaturist drawing nice looking pictures for $ 5 while you wait to be seated. Yes, for less than the price of a movie popcorn, you can have your child’s face drawn onto the body of the Incredible Hulk in full color for an eternal memory that will light up his bedroom wall for years. They also provide an autograph book so the kids can run around the restaurant collecting autographs from all of the characters they meet. A photographer comes around to take photos and a fantastic close-​up magician will entertain even the most skeptical of diners.
All told, Magic Time Machine is something that must be experienced to be believed, especially if you have kids. My kids 10 and 6 couldn’t wait to go back, my wife made me promise to never take her there again, and I’m still stuck in purgatory.
But gosh, I really love those caricatures of my kids.

I love the theme of this place, the costumes, the characteristics.
I don’t like the food. I would come here for the atmosphere and a few drinks, and maybe even dessert but that’s about it…

We have 5 year old twins. It’s funny to see their reactions when experiencing new things. They were in for a treat at magic time machine. One would think a place called Magic Time Machine with waiters dressing up in costumes would be light and bright. However, it wasn’t. It was dark, gloomy, and depressing. We waited 45 minutes for a table and I almost fell asleep. The music didn’t help either.
We got escorted to our table which was a hut. I was expecting Disney princesses or spider man, but we got Captain Jack Sparrow. This place would have gotten 5 stars if it was Johnny Depp ;). My kids, however, have not seen the Pirates of the Carribean and didn’t know who he was. They just stared at this guy with the Jack Sparrow accent all wide eyed. Every time he would come by they would inch closer to Dad. lol
The food. I thought I just got the wrong thing, but by the looks of the reviews it wasn’t just me. I got the sliced brisket with veggies and potatoes. What was I thinking in getting sliced brisket? I’m not at a BBQ restaurant. Anyway, It was more like a pot roast that sliced brisket. *shrugs*
We might return one day… MIGHT

I don’t think a Time Machine quite accurately describes what’s in store for people here. It’s more like a Magic Dimension Machine that warps you to some house of a demon possessed grandma that is filled with narcotized young adults that couldn’t make it into Hollywood. The staff members are dressed up as the hobo version of your favorite childhood characters and they also smell a bit like shattered dreams. How could kids be entertained by a demented Mad Hatter? I expected the environment to be happy and cheerful, at least for the kids, but they are being tricked with a makeshift costume a drug addict acquired from the thrift store.
What makes it worse is how dim and depressing it is on the inside. There isn’t any background music playing, making it even creepier. Think about sitting in an old abandoned house hearing children laughing in the distance. Now, think about having to pay to be in that sort of nightmare. Is the picture painted yet?
So what makes everything better when you thrust yourself into the most awkward restaurant of all time? Booze, also known as, «Magic Potion», according to our waitress Esmeralda.
We gladly sipped on various medicine while seated within a secluded acorn-​like hut completely lined with aging tapestry. While we waited for our less than spectacular generic American food, my group enjoyed yelling obscenities at a random passerby, under the impression that we could not be heard from the protective nut we were in.
The chicken was probably bought with imprinted grill lines and tasted like it had been microwaved. The $ 14 price tag for pasta probably compensated for the huge mound they gave. I can’t imaging what a $ 12 kids meal looks like, but I guess you can get a to-​go box. The salad car buffet contraption is limited to only iceberg lettuce salad that is not worth your effort in chewing and they have in-​house made croutons that are easily mistaken for shortbread cookies. It was all so very bizarre.
I don’t think I’d ever want to come back on my wallet or pay for this kind of experience again. You just leave feeling a bit violated. Leaving from a kids restaurant to the next door Hooters does not help one bit either.
This is the perspective from someone that is not a parent. No judgment here if you decide to traumatize your rascals with a disturbing Peter Pan.